Jen & Jeff's Adventures

 
 

I've spent much of the past two weeks decorating my classroom. I've put up pictures of the weather, designed a cool calendar, and renamed the groups. Our groups used to be called: one, two, three... six. My co-teacher and I decided that something a little more exciting and fun would be a nice change for this new term. So we decided on county names - one country from each continent.

We now have Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Italy, and Uganda. I made signs with names and flags and hung them from the ceiling over each table group.

When I went in to teach my grade fives today I was shocked and dumbfounded to find out that some of them did not want to sit at the Uganda table. They kind of whined and moaned a bit when they were assigned to that group.

After class, my other co-teacher (not the one that made up the group names with me, but the new one... ) said (in her slightly broken English) that maybe the students didn't want to sit at the Uganda table. She seemed to indicate that perhaps we should change the name (at least that's what I was expecting her to say). She said that "maybe students don't like Uganda because it's a black country, it's in Africa". Well... my mouth just dropped. I had nothing to say to her... I was in complete and utter shock. Did she actually just say that?!! I got defensive, and mentioned that I had lived in Uganda for a year, and that it was a great country (I wanted to say that the people were much friendlier than they are in Korea... I was SO MAD!!!) I think she noticed my reaction because she then suggested that we teach the students a bit about Uganda because they don't know anything about it. She said that she couldn't tell the students anything about the country (hence her decision not to call them on their rude remarks and reactions to being seated at the Uganda table...) so I could do that.

Just thinking about the remark and that conversation make my blood boil. The Korean school system doesn't seem to teach multicultural education (I base this partly on the fact that I get pointed at and called foreigner by some of the younger students at the school - how inappropriate!!!) I know that Korea is still a fairly new country in terms of its independence, and that there are not a lot of foreigners here, but I am still shocked by the racism that exists, even in the teaching staff. It makes me so mad.

So, this is just a rant. I don't think that all Koreans are racist, and I am happy that my co-teacher is willing to help me teach the kids about Africa, but I am still in utter shock that this happened....

~Jen

 


Comments

Jackie

Fri, 14 Mar 2008 08:06:59

Wow. I'm sure that was an eye opening experience. Well, at least have the opportunity to teach them a bit about Africa and open their minds to another culture. Hopefully that info gets passed on to others outside of the classroom. Good luck and let me know what the results are (ie. if the kids were receptive and perceptions were changed)

 

Ness

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 05:12:00

Yeah...it's sad isn't it? I was introducing myself to one of my grade 3 classes and asked the kids...where am I from? And this girl goes "Africa." I was a little stumped for two seconds and then went on to talk about Canada. I dunno...it wasn't as bad as your experience...but still it is one that surprised me. Even though I am very aware of the racism that exists here.

 

Kelly

Sun, 16 Mar 2008 15:16:18

Oh dear...

Trying to be open-minded about the whole experience, Koreans probably have not had the exposure to a lot of different cultures (unless they visit Itaewon regularly :P) and generally have a very homogeneous population, even in Seoul. With more opportunities to travel and do international business things may change. Maybe.

I actually ran into a similar problem teaching grade 8 kids in Canada during a summer camp when I assigned one team to be China. Apparently, as I was informed by a student, all Chinese people are dirty and carry disease. I was dumbfounded and hauled him outside for a "talk".

 



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